Admittedly, I had low expectations from the start.
While there was some promise courtesy of the fact that Kazuki Nakashima, the guy who wrote Gurren Lagann and Kill La Kill helmed the script for the project, it looked like a hollow cash grab to me. What's popular right now? Anime! No, Batman! Why not both? It's a philosophy that worked out pretty well on that Batman: Gotham Knight anthology film, but for an entire 85 minute film with a point A to point B narrative, it's just too flimsy of a motivation and a set-up.
The writing is not amongst Kazuki Nakashima's finest works, it's not idiosyncratic, metaphoric or laced with foreshadowing and symbolism, it's just a really routine storyline that does feel like somebody's fan fiction. I am also shocked at how botched a lot of the characters are. With the exception of Bruce Wayne/Batman himself, all the other characters feel off in some way, not at all like their well defined comic book universe counterparts. When you have something with as much history and established character as Batman, you know you done screwed up when you fail to get the characters right.
For me the real nail in the coffin though was the visuals. To answer your question Argent, it was done by a Japanese studio from what I can tell; Kamikaze Douga and Yamatoworks, but they aren't studios that I am particularly familiar with. Based on the clunky use of cel-shaded CG, a look that never works when it comes to anime adaptations, just look at the terrible, current Berserk animated series or what badly done cel-shaded CG has done to shows with massive potential like Aijin, I would wager to guess that these studios are brand spanking new complete with inexperienced animators and minimal series to their credit.
So, you have DC, which is usually to be commended for allotting decent budgets to animated adaptations of their finest characters blatantly outsourcing an "original concept" that did have some potential to a studio with little experience and one that made Batman into a lousy CG anime, this is just a colossal blunder.
The shot compositions, the lack of colour coordination, the needlessly convoluted and impossible to discern action sequences, the stock RWBY style character designs, the entire film looks like a poorly conceived cut scene from an early PS2 era video game. Cel-shading can work, but only when it is done well and only when it comes to video games, a medium you can immerse yourself in and explore (think The Wind Waker or Okami). It does not work when it comes to an active viewing experience. Between the visuals, a middling and all around average story and the botching of established characters, it's no wonder why fan response has been so darn split and or negative on this thing. If they took the same story and fronted enough of a budget to land a studio like Madhouse or Bones or Trigger for the animation, it could have gotten by on style alone, but damn, is it ever an ugly, ugly movie.
The voice acting was pretty lousy too, the english dub and the original Japanese vocal track leave much to be desired and in the dub version, the dialogue barely synchs up, really noticeably bad dubbing.
